An Incredible Closing Night of La Traviata amidst a Large Audience at the Amman Opera Festival

An Incredible Closing Night of La Traviata amidst a Large Audience at the Amman Opera Festival

The Amman Opera Festival, first ever opera festival in the Arab world, closed its La Traviata opera shows on Saturday, July 22, at the Roman Amphitheatre witha large audience who expressed their admiration with a big round of applause at the end of the performance. Soprano Zeina Barhoum concluded the show covering Fairuz's Zahrat Al Madaen, paying a tribute to Jerusalem in solidarity with the ongoing incidents there.

At the closing night of the performance, the organizers thanked over 150 International musicians and dancers from across China, Spain, Georgia, Italy, Jordan, Sri Lanka, the Czech Republic, and Peru, Prof. Alessandor Cavanna, Principal of the I.M.S. Liceo Sandro Pertini (Sandro Pertini State High School) that translated La Traviata from Italian to English through its student Erica Marrone under the supervision of her teacher Monica Baracchini, and Pianist and Project Manager Alberto Macri. The organizers also thanked the Associazione Culturale Euritmus (music institute of the Italian city Rovereto) and the Progetto Opera that cooperated in forming the technical group (stage manager and his assistants), and Klaus Broz, artistic director of Euritmus and lead cello player of the orchestra.

The first performance witnessed the attendance of HRH Princess Muna Al Hussein, who is the Royal Patron of the festival in cooperation with the Embassy of The People's Republic of China, Embassy of France, Embassy of Italy, Embassy of Ukraine and Embassy of Georgia along withpublic figures and artists from Jordan.

Zeina Barhoum's motivation behind this initiative is to plant the seeds towards growing the opera culture in Jordan and the Arab world, and perhaps inspire the building of a purpose-built Opera House in Jordan's Capital, Amman, joining the company of other Arab states such as Oman and the UAE.